Tom Wijsman posted on Wed, 22 May 2013 00:52:15 +0200 as excerpted: > In the Portage tree we could avoid users from having to mask files, > because that could break their system anyway; eg. Go mask some typical > files [1], you'll end up breaking package compilations in the long run > as they need these files installed on your system.
And a knife or hammer can be used to murder or commit suicide as well; that doesn't mean they're bad tools, it means the user is misusing them. > In Portage the /etc/package.* files are a good example, more advanced > include / exclude file masking in the same way would certainly be a > benefit and some kind of base / profile forced install unmask too. Not a bad idea. There's more advanced knives and hammers too, but you don't have to procure the most expensive one to do the job. In some cases, even a heavy screwdriver can be used as a hammer, if that's what you have in your hand and the hammer's down the ladder in the toolbox. > In other Package managers, I assume this madness isn't supported. That might be part of why I don't use other PMs... > In its current state, it certainly has its use cases; though it is often > misused by unaware users that don't know what removal of certain files > has as a consequence, that means it can do more bad than good... > > [1]: http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-670094.html > First INSTALL_MASK I came across searching for it online, > particularly masking *.h, *.pc and Makefile* are very bad ideas. Did you read the use case? He is (was, that was 2008) doing the builds for his 2GB drive netbook on different build system, then doing binpkg installs on the netbook. In that case, INSTALL_MASKING those filetypes for installation to the netbook, where he has no intention of doing any building anyway, makes quite a lot of sense. In fact, I have a netbook (tho it has a much larger 100+ gig drive) and could use the idea myself (altho currently I don't run a PM at all on the netbook, instead rsyncing from the build image on the main machine, so I'd have to modify his use case... or mine... somewhat). As for people misusing the available tools, gentoo has always taken the position that we make the tools available and document how to use them, but we aren't a babysitting or handholding distro, and if handholding is what people want/need, they better look elsewhere as gentoo's simply not in that market, and doesn't pretend to be. -- Duncan - List replies preferred. No HTML msgs. "Every nonfree program has a lord, a master -- and if you use the program, he is your master." Richard Stallman
